Monday 14 May 2012

Owls in the Night - Dealing with Toddler Fears

I heard a blood curdling scream yesterday afternoon, followed by loud footsteps and flying thud. We have baby gate on Joseph's door due to sleep walking. I went upstairs and Joseph was shaking, his skin looked blue, his eyes wide.

"The owls the owls", he shrieked.

P1000559
Photo by Nemodus

Of course no child of mine is going to have normal fears, like monsters! It appears Joseph is fixated on owls. I am suspecting it comes from the Gruffalo movie, which he has started watching.

Last night we had it again. He went to bed then about half an hour after settling down, it started again. I explained that there are no owls in his bedroom, and that owls are really quite friendly birds, and nothing to be scared of.
Peek-a-boo
Photo by Mario Davalos

A lot of Joseph's books feature owls, and I have some lovely new books to read to him, and share with you for a review this week, very timely!

I am hoping its just a phase and will pass soon. I find it interesting that I remember very clearly at the same age being scared of penguins. My fear was from driving through the town of Penguin in Tasmania and seeing this creature.



Overtime my fear lessened as I developed more happy images of penguins, and I am hoping I can do the same with the owls!

Wish me luck!


5 comments:

  1. I have a love of owls (the only winged creature i do like) mainly because of my all time favourite book as a child, The Owl who was afraid of the dark. I was and still am a little scared of the dark and i loved that this baby owl was too maybe that would help?

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  2. Joshua has night terrores about food being takien of him! I was shaking my head thinking why cant you have desant normal night terrors, (josh loves food and very really shares food!)

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  3. Hi Kylie, My son won't let me leave his glasses where he can see them at night, as in th dark he says they look like Monsters eyes.... Go figure! Hope he gets over his fear soon. Lots of stories about cuddly owls - perhaps The Owl who was Afraid of the Dark? That is a favourite of me two.

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  4. Sarah Maison Cupcake16 May 2012 at 11:39

    Oh dear! My son came home yesterday with a photograph of himself with a real live owl on his shoulder!! They had a group called "Owl Time" who came in with four owls for all the children to see up close. I guess you'd better check with your school whether they're due to pay you a visit!!

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  5. Check out monster-defense.com. We have a wonderful-smelling spray available now & a fun, illustrated children’s story coming out in Dec 2013-Jan 2014 that tells the story of a little boy with a monster in his room, and how he overcame his fear of monsters. In researching online prior to writing the book, we read many articles from child & adolescent psychologists and parents about recommended methods for dealing with fear of monsters, and interpreted this into a fun, rhyming story which gives parents direction on how to help & gives kids the tools necessary to overcome their fear.

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